20 IRISH SPELLING 



gaily decked with coloured feathers, but if the man wants 

 to hit the mark he will drop the bow and arrow, and use 

 the plain dull Birmingham gun metal. He would be a 

 fool to do otherwise. Why, the Coisde Gnotha, the 

 executive body of the Gaelic League itself, show a good 

 example. The other day they caught sight of a small 

 band of mischievous busy bodies trespassing upon what 

 they, the Coisde Gnotha, no doubt honestly regarded as 

 1heir own preserve. It was no time to mince matters. They 

 threw down their quill pens, shut their standard dictionaries 

 with a slap, and launched forth a manifesto in the language 

 of -'Birmingham ! The shot seems to have missed its 

 mark, but at least it went off with a great bang. The 

 advocates of reform are duly grateful for the advertisment. 



Perhaps I have said enough about alphabets. One 

 might have thought this was merely a matter of con- 

 venience and economy. But so far from being a non- 

 controversial question, there are many who seem to regard 

 it as the most important of all the crucial question. 

 And it is a curious fact that among those who regard the 

 work of our Society with suspicion and alarm are several 

 persons who have no intention of learning to read a word 

 of the language. " We know no Irish," they complain, 

 " but at least do not rob us of our alphabet." Such persons 

 are not at all interested in spelling, but in spite of them 

 I must pass on to that most exciting subject. I want 

 to show that our Society is not so reckless and revolutionary 

 as some of you imagine. 



People who talk about " departing from the time- 

 honoured system of the last thousand years " would do 

 well to control their antiquarian enthusiasms by a patient 

 examination of the facts. During the last thousand years 

 there have been many changes. A thousand years ago, 

 for example, the sound of t>, except at the beginning of 

 words, was commonly represented by p, and that of t> 

 by t>. The initial changes of aspiration and eclipsis were 

 rarely expressed in writing, and when they came to be 

 expressed the value of the symbols used varied greatly 

 from time to time. Thus, in Old Irish, the symbol rh stands 



